


A piece of you

by samariumwriting



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, Love Letters, M/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-06
Updated: 2020-02-06
Packaged: 2021-02-28 02:07:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,948
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22586110
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/samariumwriting/pseuds/samariumwriting
Summary: When Dimitri and Felix are apart, they write each other letters.-As much as it was unfortunate, both Dimitri and Felix were busy men with a lot of land to govern and people to direct. Sometimes, that just meant they worked separately and came together at the end of a long day, finding a moment to relax, finally, together.Those were the nights Dimitri preferred. With the candles blown out and all issues pushed away until dawn crept through the curtains, he could burrow himself under his sheets and Felix would hold him close. They’d lie, fingers intertwined, until the rose of dawn started to make streaks in the cloudy morning sky. Dimitri almost always slept well with Felix by his side, and woke up warm with a smile on his face.
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/Felix Hugo Fraldarius
Comments: 18
Kudos: 62
Collections: Project Sworn





	A piece of you

**Author's Note:**

> This is my contribution for the community zine as part of Project Sworn! I wrote it quite a while ago now because the finished thing took a long time to be put together and released but I really enjoyed writing it

As much as it was unfortunate, both Dimitri and Felix were busy men with a lot of land to govern and people to direct. Sometimes, that just meant they worked separately and came together at the end of a long day, finding a moment to relax, finally, together.

Those were the nights Dimitri preferred. With the candles blown out and all issues pushed away until dawn crept through the curtains, he could burrow himself under his sheets and Felix would hold him close. They’d lie, fingers intertwined, until the rose of dawn started to make streaks in the cloudy morning sky. Dimitri almost always slept well with Felix by his side, and woke up warm with a smile on his face.

But they couldn’t always spend their nights together. Sometimes, Felix’s work demanded he return home to the Fraldarius lands and help out there. If there was a poor harvest, a bandit problem, anything out of the ordinary, he was off to his lonely castle, leaving Dimitri in his.

Sometimes, the separations were for several moons. Particularly if the winter was rough, sometimes it made more sense for Felix to stay home. To maintain order, to support the people who needed it. Dimitri’s affection paled in comparison to the needs of the people of Fraldarius territory, and he understood that. It didn’t stop him from missing him.

In those weeks apart, moons apart, they wrote letters to each other. When Dimitri first sent a letter to Felix, when their relationship was barely formed, he worried irrationally that he wouldn’t get a response. That Felix would somehow think that he was silly, overly emotional, and ignore the whole thing. That the intensity of the connection they experienced together would fade when they were apart.

He needn’t have worried, of course, because he always worried too much (about the strangest things, Felix said, and then he’d smile fondly, nudge Dimitri in the ribs, and press a quick kiss on his cheek). Felix’s returning letter was full of sentiments Dimitri knew he struggled to put into words. Things Dimitri knew Felix felt through his actions, through his face and voice, but were still heartening to read.

Dimitri may have shed a tear of joy or two into the first letter. He reread it every evening before bed, and slept with it on his bedside table, every single night until the next letter arrived. The pattern repeated, until Felix announced in his next letter that he would soon return. With that, Dimitri folded every letter into a box and put them there for the next time they were parted.

The pattern was always the same: once Felix left, Dimitri waited in anticipation of the first letter carrier. Felix would send good tidings, inform him of his safe arrival in Fraldarius territory, and talk about anything business related. And then the topic would drift to kinder things, warmer feelings, before Felix wrapped the letter up with wishes for his good health.

Dimitri would write in return, and receive Felix’s reply. Writing the letters was Dimitri’s second favourite part of any day from Felix’s departure until his return; it was a time of week when he could think about anything, write about everything - be it mundane or important - and tell Felix just how much he adored him.

He honestly delighted in throwing everything he had into it. Every word of endearment, every feeling he ever felt towards Felix, the tiny details he didn’t even know if Felix was aware of (the length of his eyelashes, the way his smile lifted his cheekbones, the shine of his hair under the evening sunlight, the sound of his unrestrained laughter filling the training ground). Even though he wrote the letters all alone, he felt like Felix was there with him if he just thought hard enough.

His favourite part of his day when Felix was gone was, of course, getting to read Felix’s letters to him. They carried him through darker, lonelier hours full of all the tasks he didn’t want to do, lifted him through the news he knew in his heart was unavoidable but wished it wasn’t (people did not deserve to suffer and starve in winter, but aid could not get everywhere all at once until the roads were repaired properly).

Felix sometimes teased him for the overly poetic content of his letters, asking him if his heart had finally gone soft. Of course, he’d then follow those words up by telling Dimitri how much he valued that kind heart and cherished all the time they could spend together, so he knew it was only teasing.

They went back and forth, back and forth, until Felix returned to him in Fhirdiad, and the letters were never mentioned again. They were only a thing for when he was away; Felix never thanked him for the correspondence when he was back at his side, and for his part, Dimitri never mentioned it either. It was almost a separate part of their life together, something reserved almost entirely for colder times.

Dimitri honestly didn’t scrutinise their habit or anything close to that much at all. It was something he adored doing, enjoyed looking back on, and one day hoped he could look back on the letters with Felix with fondness. Perhaps he could tease Felix for the things he’d said and watch him blush, or point out particular lines that meant the most to him.

The part of all of this he didn’t expect was uncovered a few years into their letter swapping - Felix had gone out to Fraldarius territory just as the harvest started to come in due to reports of bandits that couldn’t be easily driven out because everyone was needed on hand in the fields. He took a small contingent of soldiers from the army with him, and when his first letter arrived to Dimitri it came in the form of an emergency messenger. Galatea had been hit by blight, and the people were in revolt. More help was needed urgently.

Perhaps it wasn’t the smartest idea, but Dimitri went himself. He was most comfortable dealing with lives in conflict when he was the one there, though he would rather not be there lance in hand. He left his other advisors with orders to begin the organisation of a supply train and set out in person.

Though it had barely been days since they last saw each other, Dimitri embraced Felix just as he did when they’d been apart for moons. Felix shoved him off, but he was smiling. “You’re just like a dog,” he said, frowning slightly. “Come inside. When was the last time you were in Fraldarius territory?”

Dimitri glanced back at the castle gates, where a page was leading his horse in the direction he vaguely recalled the stables being in. “Shouldn’t we be getting to the root of the rebellion?” he asked.

Felix waved a hand, looking as collected as always. “I have people working on it,” he said. “I said you were coming to talk to them personally and things have, unsurprisingly, calmed down a little.”

“...I didn’t reply,” he said with a frown. Felix only nodded, leading him through the entrance hall he barely remembered and then through several corridors he couldn’t recall at all. Finally, they came to a room he did recognise. Rodrigue’s office.

“I’ll get you up to date on everything, unless you need to rest before all that,” Felix said, making his way to where a lamp stood on the desk. He lit it, pulling the curtains closed to cover the dim evening light and keep the little warmth of the room in. “Do you?”

Dimitri was still standing, slightly struck, at the doorway. “My apologies,” he said, chuckling slightly uneasily. “It’s been a long time since I was in this room.” The last time would have been...he travelled through Fraldarius on his way back to the capital when Garreg Mach fell now over ten years ago. He’d been in Fraldarius lands and even the castle since then, but never Rodrigue’s office.

“You’ll want to get used to it,” Felix said, moving to get an armchair from next to the bookcase and move it so there were two chairs at the desk. “There’s quite a lot in the way of papers to get through, if you don’t mind coming over.”

“Of course,” he said, making his way over to take the seat Felix hadn’t taken. As he did so, he caught one of Felix’s hands in his own, making him blush. He chuckled. “Go ahead and begin.”

There was, in fact, lots of explaining to do. This crisis was, seemingly, far more complicated than a blight, and Dimitri found himself marvelling at how well Felix was doing his job. He had everything in front of him ready, or almost to hand. “Hang on,” Felix said halfway through an explanation, pulling open the drawer next to Dimitri’s feet and shutting it almost as quickly.

But before he got it closed, Dimitri saw...familiar handwriting. “Felix,” he said, and Felix’s movements, which had been smooth and effortless as he took Dimitri through the minutiae of overdue land drainage coming at the wrong time, stuttered to a stop. “Are those letters?”

“They’re not important,” Felix said shortly. His hand moved to a different drawer to find new papers, and despite the importance of their endeavour, Dimitri caught his hand to stop him. Felix looked at him, an expression of faint exasperation gracing his face. Faint, fond exasperation. “Fine, they are important.”

“Did you keep them all?” he asked. He...he hadn’t dared hope that Felix would. He knew he was important to Felix, he couldn’t exactly doubt that after all this time together, but somehow Felix still found ways to surprise him with how much he cared.

“They’re nice,” Felix said, a blush starting to form on his cheeks. It never ceased to delight Dimitri just how easily he could fluster Felix with only the weight of his sincerity. “I read them sometimes, when we’re apart.”

Dimitri leaned in to kiss him; there was no other option, really. He couldn’t just sit there and listen to Felix talking about feelings that matched his own. When he withdrew, there was a soft smile (the one that raised his cheekbones just ever so slightly) on Felix’s face. “I do the same,” he said. “I always miss you terribly-”

“And it’s like having you there beside me,” Felix finished, leaning in for a second kiss. When they came up for air, he withdrew slightly and reached for the papers he’d been trying to find from the beginning. The whole time, he kept the fingers of his left hand entwined in Dimitri’s own.

Papers laid out in front of them, Felix rested his head on Dimitri’s shoulder and took him through the rest of the information he needed. He was listening, of course, but mostly Dimitri was thinking of that bundle of paper wrapped in twine. It made his heart feel full, knowing that the love he felt so deeply was returned so alike in kind.

-

King Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd and Duke Felix Hugo Fraldarius were, respectively, the last of their lines, and close for the duration of their lives. For years, the reason as to why neither ever married was a mystery, considering the time of peace the King and his Shield brought about and the long lives they both lived. Years later, however, the Archbishop released documents entrusted to them upon the pair’s death: two boxes of letters, full to the brim, covered with expressions of deepest love unlike those found in any surviving literature before or since.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! :) if you enjoyed, please consider leaving me a comment or following me on twitter @samariumwriting. As part of the Project this fic is also illustrated by @dracoryss so please check their work out too!


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